Law Students Get New Trial For Detroit Man Convicted Of Murder

ANN ARBOR (WWJ/AP) – The Michigan Supreme Court has granted a new trial to a Detroit man whose effort to overturn his murder conviction has been led by law students at the University of Michigan.

Dawan Tyner, 36, has been in prison since 2007 for second-degree murder. But newly discovered evidence shows he wasn’t at the crime scene in 2005.

“The only evidence of any sort against Dawan was one eyewitness, and even he admitted that he ‘coulda been wrong’ in thinking Dawan was one of the shooters,” Michigan Innocence Clinic said in a statement.

Wayne County Judge Vonda Evans granted Tyner a new trial in 2012, but the state appeals court reversed her decision in a 2-1 ruling.

The Supreme Court now has reversed the appeals court. In a 6-0 order released Saturday, the state’s highest court says Evans, not the appeals court, was in a “superior position” to evaluate witnesses and the new evidence.